1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an air-conditioner for use in an automobile, and in particular, relates to an electromotive compressor of the air-conditioner for use in an automobile.
2. Description of Prior Art
In recent years, demands or requirements are strongly made or called for upon a regulation on an amount of discharge of carbon dioxide and/or on reduction of harmful materials. For achieving such the requirement, in particular in an automobile, development is actively made on an electric car, applying a fuel cell or battery of low pollution as an electric power source therein, and it is practiced in actual. On the other hand, an xe2x80x9cidle-stopxe2x80x9d (or xe2x80x9cidling-stopxe2x80x9d) car is put onto markets as a one, which can be practiced immediately by the technology of the present time.
By the way, in an automobile is used an air-conditioner for excusive use for cooling, however in a gasoline engine car or a diesel engine car, in general, an open-type compressor is used as such the compressor to be applied in the refrigeration cycle for use in the air-conditioner. Since this kind of compressor is driven by a driving source, such as, an engine for driving the vehicle, the compressor can be driven for conducting air-conditioning within an interior of a car, without any trouble, even when the vehicle stops, as far as the engine operates in the idling condition.
However, since the engine is stopped when the car stops in such the idle-stop car, therefore there is a drawback that the air-conditioning cannot be continued or conducted during this time period. In particular, the temperature within the car can be easily come up, for example on traffic jam in the middle of summer, therefore it brings about a problem. Also, in the electric car, since no engine is installed but a motor as the driving source of the vehicle, even assuming that the compressor is connected to the motor to be driven, the driving source of the compressor go away or does not operate when the car stops, in the same manner as was mentioned above, therefore also occurs a problem that the air-conditioning is unavailable.
For dissolving such the problem, a so-called an electromotive compressor is now taken into the consideration, wherein an electric motor is installed within an enclosed or hermetic chamber, so as to operate the compression mechanism by using it as the driving source thereof.
For example, in Japanese Patent Laying -Open No. Hei 11-44296 (1999) is described a scroll compressor or a rotary compressor, having the compression mechanism of high efficiency, wherein a horizontal-type electromotive compressor is applied as the compressor for use in an automobile.
Also, in this publication is listed up as problems, that the car receives inertia due to sudden stop or start and when accelerating or decelerating suddenly, as well as, inertia when ruing on a curve or doing a U-turn traveling, and that the car runs uphill or downhill and is stopped or parked on a slope. The enclosed or hermetic-type of the electromotive compressor uses lubricating oil, being lower in viscosity than that used in the open-type, and it causes no trouble since being installed horizontally in the case of the electromotive compressor for use in home use. However, in the case when applying such the enclosed or hermetic-type electromotive compressor into the car, the lubricating oil moves depending upon the traveling condition and/or the parking condition of the car, and some times occur cases where a lubricating environment is deteriorated, such as on bearings, etc.
For dissolving such the problem, in this publication is described that, main and auxiliary bearings are made up with ball and roller bearings in the enclosed or hermetic-type electromotive compressor, and oil supply to those bearings is carried out, compulsively, by the means of an oil supply pump.
However, in the horizontal-type compressor of the conventional art mentioned above, since a tip portion of the oil supply pipe is provided or located in a lower portion on the opposite side of a motor portion in the compressor mechanism, the lubricating oil is only distributed on the side of the compressor mechanism portion in a vessel or container when the compressor is inclined in such the direction that the compression mechanism portion comes to be low, therefore the tip portion of the oil supply pipe comes out above the oil surface, thereby stopping the supply of oil, and this brings about a possibility that the shaft and the bearings causes wear-out and/or seizure. Also, in the conventional art mentioned above, since a ball bearing is used as the shaft bearing, then it brings about a problem that the manufacturing of it comes to be high in the cost, comparing to a plain bearing.
In the case where there is a possibility that such the wear-out and/or seizure occurs, it is a necessity to detect this with provision of any detection means, thereby for stopping the compressor, however, also the air-conditioning cannot be performed if such the stop occurs very often, therefore an interior air within the car comes to be an uncomfortable one for a driver and/or user.
Therefore, an object according to the present invention, is to provide an air-conditioner for use in an automobile, in which a horizontal and enclosed or hermetic-type electromotive compressor is installed as a compressor in the refrigeration cycle for use in conditioning of an interior air of a car, and each of sliding portions hardly runs out of oil, therefore being able to reduce such the uncomfortable feeling given to the user.
For accomplishing such the object as was mentioned above, according to the present invention, there is provided an air-conditioner for use in an automobile, to be used in a refrigerating cycle for conditioning an air in an interior of a car body, comprising: an enclosed or hermetic-type electromotive compressor, having: a compression mechanism portion provided within an enclosed or hermetic chamber; and an electric motor portion provided within said enclosed or hermetic chamber for driving said compression mechanism through a rotation shaft, wherein a bottom portion is defined by an interior surface of said enclosed or hermetic chamber opposing to a side surface of said rotation shaft, and further comprising; a DC power source for supplying an electric power to said enclosed or hermetic-type electromotive compressor; and a partition member for partitioning between a space including a coolant emission port of said compression mechanism and a space including a coolant emission opening for emitting the coolant from said enclosed or hermetic chamber into the refrigerating cycle, and having passages in upper and lower portions thereof; and a lubricating oil supply opening being disposed within the space including said coolant emission opening.